OVERYARN: The Gaster Effect
by H. P. Lovecats
Summary: A space opera/sci-fantasy-themed AU. A lost child looks for their mother in a universe of disappearing planets.
1. The Lost Child

Frisk was waiting with nothing but a granola bar, their cell, and a folded sheet of drawing paper in a small food shop on the Overground Hub station, sitting on a little chair in the corner, watching the long-eared, purple-furred lady behind the counter scan cards, place buns and boxed drinks into little bags and packages, and hand sweets on sticks to children. She looked over at them from time to time and returned to helping the queue that Frisk had had the bad luck of showing up just in time for, while the child let their legs rest out of their soreness from ducking and weaving through people-traffic and taking this turn and that after two days sitting and waiting alone in a pod. They rubbed the tops of their thighs, rocking slightly, and, in this current lack of occupation, picking out voices.

"Huh - I don't actually think I've seen an Earthling before," said one from someplace toward the back of the line that reminded Frisk of wings buzzing, filtered into the balanced sounds of Overcommon. "You know, not in person, anyway."

There was faint shuffling. Another buzzing voice added, "It's a small one, too."

"Small?"

"Young." Clicking mandibles. "There were a lot of Earthling families back on - I was actually on Ruehenn for a couple of months, before it got Gastered. All kinds of Earthlings there. Whole families of them. That's what their kids look like."

"Yeah, that's what I was asking, buddy. What's one doing over there by itself?"

"Waiting for someone?"

Frisk turned their head for just a second, with the words _I'm looking for my mom_ cushioned between the back of their throat and the base of their tongue, but a pair of shiny blue shells with wings sparkling in the lighting of the station outside under them had already squeezed past the line's tail to step into the crowd outside. Frisk licked their lips and turned their attention back to the front of the line.

The lady behind the counter had apparently heard, with those long, rabbitlike ears of hers. She had her lips thinned as she beamed half of a gentle, rueful smile to them before she turned to a row of shelves behind her. Frisk swore she'd started to move a little faster.

Frisk wouldn't have been surprised if there'd been more comments and questions like that among the patrons of the little shop, but talk like that had stopped standing out to them a long time ago - not over background noise like that of the television screen wide and bright and on display above a fan observable over the glass case that held the sweets, where a bombastic electrical jingle played as the letters "ECHO Broadcasting" burned themselves against gray and black in neon yellow. A couple of creatures already out of the line, one with a pale teal green claw over their mouth, started to press back toward the counter, watching the screen as the monochromatic bars pulled themselves aside like zig-zagging set of shutters.

Frisk paid the screen no mind - and, they noted, neither did the shopkeeper. The low, tinny voice of a newscaster filtered into the store and voices de-singularized into a hum as the she started to clear the cue, smile ever-deepening as those who'd been served clustered around the same spot of the counter, eyes on a face that looked, in fact, not unlike Frisk's, but older and paler, with almond-shaped eyes and black lips that quirked in a smirk before their owner started talking.

A question came to Frisk's mind, but they held it, and shifted their full focus back onto the lady behind the counter.

She stood aside for a few moments, her arms crossed, watching her customers settle in front of the screen. Then she nodded decisively, and approached Frisk with a gentle smile. Frisk straightened up in their chair, hands on the sides of the plastic seat to pull themselves back.

"Hi," they said, and she nodded.

"Sorry to keep you waiting, hun." Her voice was, like her smile, gentle but clear, calm. "I know, I could have answered your question, but, uh..." Her mouth closed for a second. Her indigo nose twitched and wrinkled. Her smile came back uneven. "It sounds like it's no small subject you wanted to talk about. I thought it wouldn't be right if I couldn't give you my undivided attention."

Frisk thought "it's okay", but didn't find themselves quite saying it. Instead, they looked at her, not angry, blank and open - and they hoped it'd be enough.

Her nose twitched again. "You're a quiet little thing, aren't you?" she said.

Frisk nodded.

She let out a small, soft "ha". "As long as you can remind me what's wrong..." She threw a quick look over her shoulder, one ear turning on her head like an antenna. Apparently catching no need for her attention from the crowd, she turned back to Frisk. "So, little friend, what was it you wanted to ask me?"

"I'm looking for my mom."

"That's not exactly a question," she said - Frisk held it in mind questioningly before judging the warmth in it; it was a joke. "But, I see." There was a pause. And with a faintly knit brow, the lady made a soft, low humming noise. "I don't think I've seen her, honey. And I'd probably remember if I had. You don't get many Earthlings this far into the heart of Overground space - I'll bet you got a lot of funny looks on your way over here."

They had. They tended to get them anywhere they went - Frisk and Mom both. True enough, Frisk hadn't met many Earthlings before, and they'd gotten fewer and fewer between the closer that they and Mom had gotten to the Core of the Overground - the less that the Core itself had gotten to look like a distant rainbow star and more like the sun of any other planet. Between the sheer difference between them in terms of height and appearance and their rarity - while Frisk had met few Earthlings, they had seen exactly no other people who looked quite like their mother - they had a tendency to turn heads anywhere that they went; and not only had Frisk alone gotten plenty of funny looks, they'd heard bits and pieces of talk like that of the two insect people who'd snuck out of the store, complete with "What is it doing here by itself?"

"My mom's not an Earthling." Frisk fished in their pocket for the drawing they had brought, and unfolded and smoothed it in their hands. "My mom looks like this."

The lady nodded and took it. She flipped it over and scanned it. Frisk wasn't an expert drawer - they'd drawn the outline of a cowlike head in black crayon, with a pair of short horns, long ears draped over shoulders, eyes with rectangular pupils, two small triangular fangs, and a couple of strategically-placed squiggly lines to indicate patches of fuzz; and zig-zagged a purple pen below it to color in Mom's tunic. They knew it wasn't a detailed likeness, but it was a likeness all the same.

As she looked, the lady squinted her eyes. Both the looking and the squinting slowed to a frozen point.

Frisk let it hold for a couple of seconds. "Have you seen her?" they eventually asked.

The lady lowered the paper. Her eyes drifted up from the drawing to Frisk. She chewed her lip for a second with rodentlike teeth. "You're adopted, huh?" she said.

Frisk nodded.

A gentle laugh. "Well, I'll bet your mom's a very special lady."

Frisk nodded again. "Mm."

"After all..." She stopped up completely for a few moments. Then she straightened up, looking over her shoulder, ears turning. Then she leaned back down to Frisk, smiling unevenly. "...I mean, I've pretty much always lived near the Core - my whole family has, you know - and the number of Earthlings I've talked to, an Arakake could count on her three right hands. But still, as an adult this deep into the melting pot of Overground space, you get surprised whenever you see a new species. What looks like a new species based on... what you've got here, at any rate."

"You've never seen anyone who looks like her before?"

"I'm afraid not." She passed the drawing back over and Frisk folded it up again, head down.

"She doesn't look like anyone else," Frisk said, trying to affirm.

"Do you know what planet her family's from?"

Frisk shook their head.

"What about her name?"

"Toriel," Frisk said. "T-O-R-I-E-L."

"If I were you, I would've looked for a guard to help you out first."

"I tried," said Frisk. "I could only find one. He was in a hurry and I couldn't make him stop to listen to me."

"Huh," said the lady, twitching the corner of her lip. She paused for a moment - and then she dialed her easy smile back up, speaking steadily. "Here's what you should do," she said. "You ought to sit down in that chair again, and relax a bit. As much as you can, anyway. I'll borrow that drawing of yours again for a few seconds and ask the customers if they've seen your mom, and then I'll call the guard office for you, okay? They'll get folks looking for her, and they'll send someone over to take you to a safe place where you can wait for her to turn up. Would you know if you've got a tracker in your cell, perchance?"

Frisk nodded. "Yeah."

"This all sound good to you?"

"Yeah."

"All righty, then." The lady flipped her hand out to take the drawing when Frisk pulled it back out and passed it over. Afterwards, she hovered her hand, pinching the drawing between two fat, padded fingers, over Frisk's head.

Frisk knew what she was doing. They offered her a twitch of a small, polite smile, and she showed her teeth contently, giving their hair a light ruffle. "Stay right there and I'll be back with you in a jiffy," she said, and turned to walk toward the mass of people crowded at the counter.

When the lady tapped her first inquiree on the shoulder, drawing already unfolded and forward to them, they moved aside, and a spot opened up in the crowd. Frisk leaned aside a bit to take a peek. The camera followed the newscaster who'd initially appeared, who, matching their face, had a body like Frisk's but longer and leaner, with long legs and long arms. "Oh my gosh, look at that _strut!_ " somebody in the crowd cooed, and the question returned to Frisk's mind. They raised an eyebrow, and tried to put the question into their eyes, scanning the edges to locate the lady again.

She'd gotten the attention of two folks. Her free hand was up, pointing and waving over the drawing. One of the two had a brow cocked high, giving their friend a sideways glance. The friend shook their head slowly. "No," they mouthed, and the lady moved on with only the most cursory glance back at Frisk.

Frisk pulled their chair back into the wall and brought up their legs to cross them. Back on the screen, the newscaster laughed loudly. "Ohhh, yes! The rumors were true indeed, lovelies! It seems this little colony _is_ home to _the_ single best waterflower wine tart and cup of subterranean prickly pear coffee in the Overground - o, _heaven in the heavens!_ But...!" They pointed their microphone like a wand and winked. "With that pleasant little detour taken, let's get right back to our directive for the afternoon, won't we?"

"Wait, what?" someone muttered. "Oh, gee, I forgot that his restaurant review block isn't for another hour!"

"Same here, friend," someone else laughed. "What's he covering right now?"

"The... the thing that's been going around has spread to the Waterfall area. Apparently."

"What thing...?"

Meanwhile, the lady with the purple fur had moved to the fringe of the crowd, picking her cell out of her pocket and sticking the re-folded drawing in its place. Frisk gave her a questioning look. She met their eyes, and her brow knit with regret.

She leaned over to speak to them above the crowd's chatting. "Do you know your mom's last name, hun?"

"Dreemurr," said Frisk. "D-R-E-E-M-U-R-R."

"Toriel Dreemurr - all right." She nodded, faced the wall, and lifted her cell to her mouth. Her eyes left Frisk to the little white light at the tip. Her ears batted. "Hello - if you could help out, I seem to have a lost child on my hands, looking for a Toriel Dreemurr...?"

She covered the cell with her available hand and started to pace - her voice fell out of Frisk's hearing. In spite of themselves, they started to frown slightly, and leaned after her, uncrossing their legs and kicking their heels in the air underneath their seat. The crowd, meanwhile, continued to speak.

"Are ECHO nodes malfunctioning really a big deal out in the Waterfall area?"

"Buddy - ECHO nodes malfunctioning _anywhere_ are more of a big deal than you think."

"Shaddup, would you? Shh, shh, shh! I can't hear Mettaton's voice over you two!"

"All righty," said the voice of the lady, coming back in. Frisk's brow lifted high over their eyes, and as she turned to approach, they hopped off their chair and crossed the store floor to stand next to her. Her eyes darted down to them and she acknowledged them with a flick of a smile and a nod. "Thanks a lot," she said into the cell, and with a flick of her thumb, the little white light on its side shut off. "You were giving me a look, hun." She raised a brow, looking down at Frisk again. "Did you have something to say?"

Frisk took a moment to remember what she meant - and a little light went on in their head.

"Yeah." They nodded. Their hair fell in their eyes and they brushed it away before pointing at the TV screen.

"Something you heard on the TV?"

"Is the news reporter an Earthling?" Frisk asked, looking between her and the small gap still open in the crowd to the screen.

The lady's ears wagged as she shook her head. "Ah-nope," she said. "You're too young to know about that, huh? Or do you and your Mom not watch a lot of TV?"

"No."

"Fair enough - though I would have thought you'd have at least seen his picture out there somewhere. That's Mettaton. He's a robot." The lady had on a bright but patient smile, her rodentlike teeth showing. "A real smart one." She tapped her temple with a thick, padded finger. "They put a computer in his brain that they say runs just like a real brain - that pretty much is a real brain. Now, I can't know how true that is - only Dr. Alphys up at ECHO-Tech really knows that, that's his developer - but... he's got an independent personality, that's for sure. It shows, doesn't it?"

The lady gave a smirking upward nod in the direction of the screen, on which the reporter swayed his hips, leaned on his leg, and cocked his head as he held his microphone out to a creature resembling a bubble of sludge with a kaleidoscope eye. " _Oh?_ " he said, quirking his brow and twisting his lip into a smirk. "Well, nobody mentioned _that_ in the briefing." He let out a soft laugh, which cut off inorganically. There was a sudden flick of a glowing pink eye to the camera and back to the creature. "Would you happen to have any other _scrumptious_ tidbits to share with the hungry galaxy, darling...?"

The lady paused for a moment. "Speaking of ECHO-Tech," said said, "it sounds like that's what's got the guards so busy today. Technology's been acting up throughout the station. It's caused... well, concerns. Security concerns, info tech concerns..." She noticed that Frisk had again started frowning, and put on yet another easy smile. "Nothing that's gotten anyone hurt, as far as I've picked up - don't worry."

Whether anyone had been hurt had occurred, in fact, only secondarily to Frisk. The thought of technology malfunctions made Frisk think mainly of machinery winding down, as if due to depletion of batteries, which seemed unrelated; and explosions, which Frisk imagined they'd have heard directly or heard of if they'd happened.

"Is... Is someone coming, though?"

"Yeah." The lady's smile showed teeth again. "Don't worry about that. They told me they'll have a fella down here in just... five minutes, I think? In the meantime, sit tight. Can I get you anything?"

"I don't have any money."

"Cup of... Well, I don't know. Milk tea, maybe, on the house?"

Frisk accepted, and the lady patted them on the head again and moved behind the counter.

There was a hiss.

Back on the TV screen, the reporter Mettaton's smile had grown dark. He said, hyper-articulately, " _Quite - all - right._ " He pouted, faintly. "Are you _sure_ , honey...?"

The sludgey person made a squelching noise into the microphone, under which Frisk just barely heard the words of Overcommon. The hiss repeated. The crowd flinched. It rose to a sputtering.

And then to a squeal.

The lady's ears twitched and shuddered at the drink machine. "What the devil _is_ that?" she said.

And then the image on the screen burst into rainbow colors, and then to black.

The crowd collectively groaned and whined.

"Geez!" someone said.

"Ma'am, could you come over and fix this?"

"I'm in the middle of something here," she said.

The crowd turned to her, and Frisk, half anticipating to be looked at next, hopped off their chair and moved over to the end of the counter, between them and the lady.

One person did look - right past Frisk, to the entrance of the store. The rest followed. And so, in a moment, did Frisk.

The lights of the station were flickering.

"Is it a power outage?" a man said.

The lady, now holding a steaming cup of a shiny silvery material, looked flummoxed. In a beat, her head started to shake. "We shouldn't be getting those," she said. "This close to the Core satellites, it doesn't make sense."

The man laughed. "And yet," he said, shrugging his shoulders up high.

A couple of the news-watchers had already started toward the door, with a last look at the TV screen, silent and black, and two more started to follow, and three more, muttering worried mutters. The lady rounded the end of the counter - she nearly bumped into Frisk in the process, catching herself at the counter's corner; a splash of bright liquid jumped up over the cup's edge, deftly caught - and the rest of the crowd turned to leave.

Just as Frisk turned to ask her another question - but the lights are still on - the store's lights started to wink. And then they dropped out entirely.

The murmur of the crowd proceeded until a departing tail held the door open for a last "See you tomorrow, ma'am" and shut, leaving Frisk and the lady alone between darkened electric lights and a floor made of warm yellow wood, now gone colder.

The lady stood leaning, arm and hip against the counter. She pressed a small, dry sigh out through her nose, brow unevenly furrowed. The look she cast down to Frisk sought solidarity, though in what, Frisk couldn't tell.

Eventually, she forced a grin and a laugh. "Not so interested in loitering now, are they?" she said. "I'll bet they're going to head in that little pack of theirs to a store that's still got their TV running."

She passed the cup of tea down to Frisk. They took it, peeked inside, and inhaled - they couldn't identify the type of tea off the fumes - and then asked, "Do you think the guard's still coming?"

"The guard cruisers here run on Core power," she said, crossing her arms and tapping the spot just above her elbow with a finger, "like most everything else here does, so if anywhere's having power troubles, I hate to say it, but it might take a little while. That said, kid - they wouldn't be much good as guards if a little inconvenience like cruiser trouble kept them from helping a person in need. Particularly a lost child."

A bright flash of light that Frisk couldn't make out the color of - red? Purple? Blue? - jumped in the corner of their vision. The lady turned to look at it at the same time that Frisk did - the screen gave a few rainbow flashes before cutting out to black again.

"...But with this off-and-on," the lady said, "hopefully you'll have a little time to finish your tea. Do you drink tea often, hun?"

Frisk nodded. "My mom has lots of it in the pod," they said.

"You know what kind?"

Frisk didn't know what to do in response to that but shake their head. "It smells like flowers," they said. "And it's sweeter than this. But it still tastes like plants, even, um. Even with milk."

"That sounds pretty fancy." Her eyes squinted partway up toward the door and she laughed. There was a pause. "Maybe it's from her home planet."

"Maybe," Frisk agreed.

They looked up after her, wondering if something had caught her attention. It was dark outside, now, and a variety of shapes crossed in front of the shop - masses of people walking in a big crowd, some of them running, some of them talking loudly. The lights blinked on for a split second. A couple of people briefly paused. The lights went dark again.

And then there was a knock at the door.

The lady started, her ears pricked high.

She looked down at Frisk again - not a lick of fear. They had the same thought in mind: "That was quick," she said. "Even for... you know. What I said. That the guard wouldn't let power trouble get in the way of doing their jobs.

There was a knock - three knocks. Quick and sure.

And the lights outside came on. They held for a few seconds - enough for Frisk to take a few steps forward, the cup of milk tea still steaming fragrant billows of cloud in their hands, and peer at the door.

A very tall and very skinny silhouette appeared against the orange light shining through the glass. Frisk looked at the lady, tilting their head. Her smile was back at the corners of her mouth, and her nose was faintly wrinkled. "Oh, boy," she whispered.

"What's wrong?"

"They would send this guy to deal with a kid," said the lady, without looking at Frisk.

The figure raised its arm and knocked.

"We're open, Agent," the lady called. "You come right on in."

* * *

 _Cross-posted to AO3._


	2. The Case of the Missing Mammal

The door started to slide, and with their heart very suddenly starting to faintly flicker, Frisk watched it. The guard became more clearly viewable, strangely, stepping out of the restored bright on the station walkway into the evenness of the dark store interior.

And Frisk's brows raised high over their eyes.

Frisk had seen many guards on brief past stops at the station. He was none of them, and looked nothing like them in any respect. He stood just a bit shorter than Mom, and was clad in bright, gold-trimmed armor pinned with three medals with red gloves and boots and a little capelet, unlike the all-gray metal that every single other Overground guard who Frisk could remember having ever seen wore. He looked important, and was of a species that Frisk had never seen before, or heard of, as far as they could remember. From under the armor came black sleeves and pants wrapped tight around arms and legs so thin that in them, it looked like they were nothing but black bones.

And on top of a thin white neck like a stem off which a shiny red-and-gold helmet hung like a backwards necklace, the guard's head, too, looked _skeletal_. It was solid white. It had no nose or ears, or lips. His teeth showed from their bases to their tips, with fanglike canines - Frisk touched their tongue to each of their own, and winced.

At the black back of each of his eye sockets, a white pinpoint of light flickered, and hovered on the lady right in the middle of his line of sight. Frisk's brow felt cold.

"It wouldn't do to enter without requesting permission," he said, with a voice like a saw cutting through a steel pipe. "Not for an illustrious agent of the Overground, and certainly, _absolutely_ not for me."

The lady chuckled as he crossed over. Frisk didn't look at her. "I know, Agent Papyrus. No... offense meant, or anything."

He was close now - just a couple of arms' lengths away from Frisk's left shoulder. They stared up. His jaw opened and shut as he talked. Frisk couldn't make out any tongue behind his long white teeth. "None taken!" he said, with a lilt that sounded somehow sharp. The hinge of his jaw began to bend itself into something that looked quite a bit like a smile. "Still, I... want to be sure that the people of the CORE Station never have reason to doubt their defenders' graciousness and courtesy."

Frisk turned in their chair again, between the lady and the guard. The guard didn't make a single move as the lady rolled her eyes with a smirk. Those eyes landed on Frisk. The guard still didn't move, staring her with what appeared, from Frisk's angle, like smiling blankness.

He brought a gloved hand up to his jaw and coughed. "I request your pardon, ma'am, but! I was summoned for something very important, no?"

"Pretty important, yeah," the lady said. She smiled at Frisk in what Frisk thought might have been meant to be a reassuring way before facing the tall guard more fully again.

"It was..." He tapped his fingers on the countertop, a sound muffled by the material of his gloves. "...an Earthling, yes? I was sent here to pick up an Earthling. An Earthling who is in need of assistance locating their missing parental unit."

The lady nodded. "If you want to put it that way, yes siree."

"Well, then, where is this Earthling?"

"You're looking at the dear," she said, pointing Frisk's way. Frisk scooted backward on their seat, leaning backward a bit, trying to look between her and the guard's face.

The apparent smile was immediately released from his face. "You don't look like any Earthling I've ever seen."

She smirked again. She lifted her pointing finger, and dropped it firmly again toward Frisk.

The guard turned his head in a jerk. Frisk tried not to jump, and succeeded. Each of their eyes landed on one bright dot of light.

Their eyes held the lights in place. The lights held their eyes in place.

The guard's jaw opened with a slight snapping sound. "An Earthling!" he gasped.

The lady hummed affirmation.

"Earthling," said the guard - and, with a sudden bark that made Frisk jump, " _Earthling!_ I am Special Agent Papyrus of the Overground Guard, _direct_ personal subordinate of the great General Undyne herself - how are you faring today?"

"The kid's lost, you know," said the lady, as Agent Papyrus craned over and held out one of his hands.

Frisk took it, and he shook it. When they tried to withdraw their hand, he held on. He watched them. They watched him.

The bottom ridge of one of his eye sockets seemed to tense. "Well?" said the agent. "Might I have your name?"

"Frisk."

"Frisk! Well and marvelous. To make your acquaintances is among the most pleasant of pleasures, little Earthling." He gave their hand another exuberant shake and then let go.

"My mom looks like this," Frisk said, pulling their drawing back out. "She's really tall. Taller than you. And she was wearing a purple shirt."

"I see - skipping over the formalities, are we?" said Agent Papyrus, taking the paper. "Cutting right to the proverbial 'chase'? Of course, of course - you are impatient for my help and I shall _not_ withhold it, Frisk the Earthling..."

His eyes flicked over it with rapid, snapping flicks, scanning it across in every direction. There was a pause. His sockets narrowed.

He held a hand up, palm to Frisk, in request for pardon as he looked back at the lady. He pointed at the drawing. "Excuse me, ma'am, would you, er, happen to recognize what manner of being is depicted by this charmingly crude sketch...?"

She shook her head. "No, and the kid doesn't know what the name for it is, either."

"Her," said Frisk, quietly.

"No matter! Obviously, we must start with what we _do_ know." Papyrus handed the drawing back and produced his cell. He tapped a button. A holographic flower - the ECHO-tech logo - hovered above a pale blue upward spotlight. His grin turned faintly self-satisfied. He ran his thumb along the wheel in the side. In a succession of flickering sounds, the light on the cell sucked up the pale flower and beamed out a screen.

On it, the news reporter from earlier was laughing again. "Well, ladies and gentlemen, amphibians and invertebrates! It seems things are _quiet_ here in this part of the Waterfall system after all. Oh, but don't touch that dial..."

"Curses," Agent Papyrus muttered. With a look up to Frisk, he added, mildly, "If you'll excuse the lowness of my High Overcommon, child."

"Need a hand over there, Agent?" The lady had an ear cocked and her smirk set.

"No, no..." Papyrus shook his head. "I'll... resolve this just as soon as I'm finished up here!" His voice on soon had spiked to a vibrating lilt. He shook it out with a cough into his glove. "Ehm. Notepad, please!"

With a ping, the screen retracted into the beam from the cell and was replaced by a blue window.

"Are you sure?" The lady leaned over the counter on her elbows, peering. "The keyboard's not coming up."

"Yes! I prefer it this way!" Agent Papyrus appeared again to grin, putting his finger to the top edge of the window. "Typing is not writing, and a notepad that you can't write in is not a notepad at all.

Frisk watched the window darken in scratchy little trails where he traces with it, trying to mirror it in their head: XXXX A.U., The Case of the Missing Mammal! An automatic inclination to smile popped into their head - they were sure neither if the agent would see it through the screen if they did nor how the implied admission to peeking would go over, and they held it like a curious secret. "Typing is not writing, and a notepad that you can't write in is not a notepad at all."

"To-ree-el Dree-murr," Papyrus said to himself, narrowing his sockets at his writing. "And... _Frissssk. Dree-murr..._ " He focused past the screen at Frisk. "That's correct, isn't it?"

"Yeah."

"Excellent. Let's move on, then! Ah - I can't specify species or planet of origin, so... where did you last see your parent?"

"In our pod," Frisk said. "In - ...on the dock. It's the purple one. She went out to get food two days ago."

"Well. That's a frightfully long time to spend getting food." Papyrus's eye sockets went circular. "After all, the station is full of it!"

The lady smirked again, and her eyes went into their corners past Frisk. She mouthed something that Frisk didn't catch.

"Mm-hm." Frisk nodded. "That's why I went out to look for her. Umm - this morning."

"Why..." On top of their roundness, the agent's eyes went larger. "You didn't spend two entire days all by your lonesome, did you, you poor child?"

"I did," said Frisk, barely understanding. "I thought she'd come back in one day, but that didn't happen, so I thought... maybe she was in trouble."

Papyrus made a "hrmmmm" noise, top and bottom of one of his eye sockets constricting. The lady behind the counter shook her head, and Frisk didn't understand that, either. "But she's usually okay with trouble," they said. "So... If she didn't come home, I thought maybe she was lost, too?"

"I see."

"I thought she was lost and in trouble. So I thought, maybe... no matter what, if we found each other, if I paid attention, I could get us both back to the pod. But I don't know where she is right now. I've, um - been asking people at places that sell food, if they've seen her or know where she went."

The agent asked them for a rundown of where they'd, in his words, _inquired after her whereabouts_ ; they were glad that Mom had taught them a decent share of less-commonly-used words, at least enough to infer as to what the word _inquired_ meant and gave them a list. He then asked them what they'd picked up, and they told him the truth: no one had, apparently, seen her, or had had any clue as to where she could have been.

Once he was finished taking down his notes, Papyrus let out a soft, sinking, faintly whining sigh: _hnnyehhh_. "This... does not give me all that much to investigate off of," he said. "Not that's immediately apparent, anyway."

Frisk wondered briefly if they should say sorry, but they weren't, and the lady continued leaning over the counter with an amount of straight-faced interest. "Are you okay?" they tried instead.

"Well..." Papyrus snickered - high and nasal. The top ridges of his eyes lifted high and the lights in them flared up. "...of - of course I am, little Earthling!" The edge from the snickering stuck in his voice a little too tightly - it made Frisk flinch a touch. "Your case presents me with a challenge! And ill-suited we of the Overground Guard would be if we weren't predisposed to challenge."

"You know," said the lady, "I think I heard they say over 99.999999-something-6-percent of space is made up of nothing at all."

"Yes, but by contrast, the remaining point-something-four-percent is all challenge!" Papyrus started to rise again. Frisk's eyes followed his eye-lights two times higher up than where they'd started. He put his arms akimbo, and grinned. It was unmistakable, bending at both hinges of his jaw. "And it's one that I suppose you and I will have to tackle back at headquarters! Surely with further discussion a key clue as to the location of your parent will make itself clear."

"Will make itself apparent," Frisk muttered, with a memory very faintly rippling through their head.

Papyrus's smile stiffened and his jaw locked. He cleared his throat - also stiffly, tightly. "N-now is not the time for jokes! Come on, Earthling - surely... surely if she's the one with a penchant for such things..." The smile, still stiff, bent itself in further. It looked slightly painful. "...you'll be making them with your parent again in no time!"

For the first time in the past three days, Frisk noticed themselves passively smiling, too, and a little warmth burning in their chest - something red like a little fire. A memory flashed through their brain of a hand on their head and a cup of tea in their hands, and a voice calling over, "Excuse me, there, ma'am, are you that kiddo's parent?" to which their mom's replied " _A-parent-ly!_ " before bursting and bubbling out into laughter.

By the time that they focused back outward, Papyrus was already halfway to the door. "There you have it! You like that idea, right?" He waved inward twice - one as an inward beckon to Frisk, and the other sweeping over and behind his head so he could pull his helmet on and salute away from it, ending in a point directed at the lady. "I believe we are done here for the time being, citizen!" he said. "Thank you, and it is my greatest honor and pleasure to be of service!"

"Thanks for your time, Agent," said the lady, still leaning on her elbows, arms crossed on the counter in front of her. Her eyes, one last time, moved aside to Frisk, and she said - trying to whisper out of Agent Papyrus's range of hearing without whispering, Frisk guessed - "I guess you paid for your tea after all, huh?" Her nose wrinkled with wry amusement. "After I called over a guy who'd give you the third degree before you had any time to drink it warm."

"It's okay," Frisk said. "Thank you. For listening and calling someone."

One last soft laugh from her. "I just hope something good comes out of it."

"Thanks."

"Oh, you don't need to keep thanking me." She shook her head. "I just want to wish you luck finding your mom."

Frisk held back another "thanks", and mulled over alternatives. They said the one which weighed off of the others best and most clearly: "Bye," they said, starting to follow Papyrus.

She nodded and said "buh-bye," twiddling her fingers in a wave that Frisk watched for as long as they could on the way out the door, waving back.

As soon as they stepped out and looked away, the lights flickered back off in the station sector. Neon pinpoints glowed on elevated levels and in little trails from a small handful's worth of passing cruisers, and the rest was about as cold as the disposable cup of tea still in their hand.

And in their chest, the burn was an _afterburn_.

Papyrus offered them his hand, from ahead of them. It took them a moment to register that that was what he was doing, and when they declined, he made a small noise. "Very well," he said. "Just... follow me close, then!"

With a brush at the portion of his capelet that circled his neck, he started into motion and Frisk did so - apparently, from the looks of what few people took breaks from chatting with those nearby and squinting and jabbing at buttons on their cells, overshadowed by the tall, skeletal alien, at least in the dark

But it fell in line somewhere behind another question that popped into mind when they scanned the area straight ahead of and in what portions of the station were viewable on upper levels and lower levels in front of or opening out ahead of them.

"Is the guard station far," they asked him, looking past buildings and clusters of crowd for a sign, or even a guard, or any guard cruiser that was running.

"Oh, yes!" Agent Papyrus nodded. "We're still merely on the fringes of the station! It's quite a large place, and guard headquarters are much closer to the center."

"Are we gonna walk there?"

"Don't be absurd." The exact words were different, but it did sound very much like Frisk had often heard the words _don't be silly_ in the past. "While I know, at least, I could certainly do it, we are on business without a moment to lose. If we can cruise to the station, then we should."

"I thought your cruisers don't work right when the power's acting strange," said Frisk.

"I thought so, too," said Papyrus, quietly, eye-lights drifting somewhere out of visibility to Frisk in their sockets. Then he perked up, head jerking back with an exoskeletal snap back to Frisk. "And that's why I accounted for that! You see, I did not come in my cruiser! Regrettably, but... for reasons of convenience."

He pointed toward their left, against the majority of the foot traffic around them. Frisk forded it sticking very close to behind him - and when he stopped, they bumped nose-first, very abruptly, into gold-tinted space armor. Papyrus caught that and swept them over beside him with a hand on their shoulder. " _Here_ is my ride!"

Frisk stared at the vehicle that they had, apparently, stopped alongside. It was no guard cruiser, indeed - there was nothing very official or ceremonious-looking about it. It was boxy and a gray that wasn't dull or shiny but wasn't tarnished, and had grimy windows. It had three low safety wheels along each side and the blue light from its thrusters was mostly clouded out by quick-dissipating colorless smoke.

As they'd tried to do with the lady in the store, Frisk tried to ask Papyrus a question with a look.

He actually noticed at once. His sockets narrowed and he lifted his chin - and a forefinger. "Now, you might be worried, Earthling, or at least mildly _disappointed_ , but worry not - this nondescript aero-van is driven by a very close longtime personal ally of mine," said the agent. "One who is no defender of the universe, but! Who we are in... reasonably good hands with. And who, if nothing else, I assure you is fundamentally one of the least threatening individuals who you'll ever meet. Come along, won't you?"

Papyrus took a step closer to the edge of the curb, pulling Frisk with him. His chest was held high. What they had by now judged that they could read as a smile off of him was in full-force. He _beamed_ down at them, and then looked up, back at the van. They watched his face - as his neck gave another hard snap, his eye-lights focused to a point that tried to stick a pin through the windows of the aero-van, and his voice drove like a drill and made them clap their hands over their ears.

 _"Brother!_ _See? I've collected the Earthling exactly like I said I would. We've got to get a move on!"_


End file.
